Friday

How did that happen? How did the day start with sunshine...






...giving us a wonderful breakfast moment in the sun room...






...then, as if changing its mind, the skies turned gray. For a while.


And how did it happen that I bought six full bags of groceries today?

And why, after taking forever to unpack them, just as I'm leaving to go to Snowdrop's home, why do I see Scotch walking up the path to our farmhouse door? The cheepers never come this way during the winter. And I mean never.






I greet her, give her some bread, but it all seems wrong to me. Where is her buddy Butter?

I go down to the barn. Butter is agitated. She's pacing the barn. Like someone awaiting test results. Agitated.

What the hell's going on here?

I look inside the coop. Oh no!





A possum is inside, eating chicken feed.

I'm due at Snowdrop's. I can't be late. Scotch is by the house, Butter is pacing, Ed's at a tech meeting and the possum is firmly inside the coop. And I mean firmly. When I approach, thinking surely he'll scamper off, he hisses his sharp teeth at me.

Slam. I close and latch the coop door, trapping him inside. I don't know if this is a dumb move or a smart move, I haven't a clue as to what the possum might do to the cheepers, but I wanted a barrier between them and him and this is the fast way to accomplish this.


And then I play with Snowdrop. I put in calls to Ed with basically one message: help! I have no clue where to go from here.

I concentrate on Snowdrop.






We play, we read, we dance -- all of it.






She is to spend the evening with us at the farmette, and by late afternoon, I pack her into the car seat and we zip home. To a beautiful sky, with an almost setting sun. (There's that blue again!)






Ed is home now and he has borrowed a trap and stuck it inside the coop. Butter is still pacing. Scotch has no interest in going near the barn. Snowdrop and I feed her bread at the picnic table.












Unfortunately, the possum, possibly well stuffed with chicken feed, has no interest in going for the food in the trap. He has settled in the roost.

I don't think he'll ever leave!

And if he does, will the girls ever want to go back?

Snowdrop and I retreat to the farmhouse to prepare supper. I make the mistake of giving her a chunk of parmiggiano reggiano which I am grating for the asparagus. She loves it so much that, for the first time, I get a strong protest when I take it away from her. So she's at heart Italian. I'm okay with that.






We eat, she eats, she naps, we play. She revels in a piece of fig newton Ed breaks off for her.






And eventually, the young couple picks her up and she goes home.

As for the cheepers? Late into the evening, the possum is trapped and Ed takes him away. Is that the end of the siege? No. As Ed carries the intruder off, he sees the second possum emerge and hover near the entrance to the barn.

It's going to be a long night.